Published By Datamonitor

French large energy users are lobbying the government to restructure electricity tariffs. Comparisons with Germany appear to reveal large disparities, placing French industry at a disadvantage; however, no action has yet been taken by the French regulator to address these concerns.

Published By Datamonitor

Deep geothermal energy in the UK has the potential to accommodate an installed capacity of 9.5GW of electrical power and 100GWth of heat to the nation's consumers, according to the Renewable Energy Association and a new report by engineering consultants Sinclair Knight Merz. Realizing this, however, will require government buy-in.

Published By Datamonitor

The US Department of Commerce has found the Chinese government to have been "unfairly" subsidizing its solar panel manufacturing industry, and is imposing punitive tariffs on imports of this technology from the country. It is yet to be seen whether Europe will follow suit.

Published By Datamonitor

March 11 marked the first anniversary of Japan's Fukushima nuclear disaster. This has caused a particularly marked policy response in Germany, where the decision has been made to abandon nuclear energy by 2022 at an estimated cost of E1.7tn by 2030. The decision appears to be motivated by political considerations rather than factual assessment.

Published By Datamonitor

Germany's decision to phase out nuclear power by 2022 is largely behind RWE's 39% fall in half-year profits. At the very least, the decision will increase Germany's reliance on coal, French (nuclear) power, and Russian gas by 20 billion cubic meters per year. Most worryingly, if unchallenged, it could give Gazprom the keys to European downstream power generation assets.

Published By Datamonitor

A report by Bloomberg New Energy Finance found that financial investment in large-scale renewable energy in Europe fell by 22% in 2010, and new financial investment in renewables in developing nations overtook that in developed nations. However, despite some immediate challenges, Datamonitor believes that Europe will fare better in attracting financial investment into renewables in the long term.

Published By Datamonitor

Germany's ambitious plan to move away from nuclear and toward renewable energy by 2022 at an estimated cost of around E90bn has received the backing of the European Investment Bank, which has agreed to fund 15% of the required investment. However, Datamonitor is less confident, and believes Germany will be an important global test case for the rapid transition to a non-nuclear low-carbon economy.

Published By Datamonitor

It has come to light that talks between Europe's fifth- and sixth-largest utilities RWE and Iberdrola were ended just before the companies planned to announce them. At the start of 2011, the two were engaged in discussions over the creation of what would have been Europe's largest power generation company. However, these plans were dropped amid concerns over political and market reactions.